I don't know - is this Paisley or something? Whoever it is, he's extremely long-winded and his most recent post is about cosmology (which has frankly been done to death).

Besides, there's really no "disproving atheism". You can hit me with all the metaphysics you want, but I'm still not seeing any gods.

Yup, still no gods.

You mean the Kalam argument?  Simple.  It still arbitrarily assigns an endpoint to the problem of infinite regress.

Q.E.D.

Fail. Kalam argument: rubbish. The universe can't always have existed, but my imaginary friend has always existed.

He equates homosexuality with genetic disease. How lovely. Apparently has stats that show homosexuals have a shorter lifespan, so it should obviuosly be illegal instead of trying to solve the problem.

The aboriginal population in Australia has a shorter lifespan, the government is trying to fix the problem (PM is taking a special interest), but according to this guy we should just make them illegal. Problem solved.

Just force them out of the situation they are living in so that they have "better lives". Oh, hang on, christian do-gooders already tried it in Australia. We call it the stolen generation. It is a national shame that is was allowed to happen.

It's basically as it sounds.  A few years back (give or take a hundred years ... or in other words from 1869-1969) Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders had their teen and pre-teen kids taken by federal/state agencies and church missions under certain laws that were enacted at the time.  No choice in the matter was given to those taken or their families.  Us white fellas just rocked up, grabbed a kid, shoved some legal papers in peoples faces (at most) and walked off.  Families in most cases were never reunited.

The idea and supposed good intentions at the time was that giving indiginous kids a chance to grow up in European-based society would better help integrate the indiginous people as a whole, but it failed miserably.  Whether successful or not is completely irrelivant, it's still a huge national embarrassment because no matter how you try to justify it, the ends in no way shape or form justifies the means.

Now, if only our government would actually do something good for the indigenous people instead of allowing the squalor and poverty to continue for yet another generation.

The movie Rabbit Proof Fence is set in this time.

Ahh, but this raises the question: who are we that we get to set the requirements for the situations to which they must adapt?

Europeans came here, slaughtered them, stole their land and did their best to ultimately eradicate their societies, culture and identity; this is beyond dispute.  Why, then, do we now get to say "sorry about all that stuff we did to destroy you, but you're going to have to solve the problems we created"?  This is akin to going to someone's house, breaking everything they have and then telling them they have to "do their part" to replace what we destroyed.

I think it's more than a wee bit presumptive that the people responsible for creating the conditions in which aboriginals across the continent find themselves also get to set the requirements for "adapting" and "taking responsibility" just because we're in the majority (one we enjoy through genocide, I should add).  Yes, any individual is ultimately responsible for changing their lives for the better; individuals must also accept responsibility for the effects of their actions.

The main objection to this point is "but *I* didn't steal their land and try to kill them, I wasn't even born!"  The problem, however, is that you are in partial control of the entity that did steal their land and try to kill them: the government.  The citizenry that controls the government is ultimately responsible for the actions of it, regardless of the fact that the demographics of both bodies are constantly changing.  Yes, many of the people who made these decisions are now dead, leaving us to clean up their mess.  That doesn't remove our responsibility to clean it up, just like our children are going to be responsible for cleaning up the messes we've made.  Freedom implies responsibility, always.  An objection could be raised that the English government  is ultimately responsible, but independence cuts both ways (this is my main objection to the Quebec separatists' stance that they aren't responsible for their portion of the debt if they decide to secede; you break it, you buy it).

I will, however, be the first to say that no one but the aboriginal communities of North America can solve their pervasive drug and alcohol problems.  Given what seems to be a literal genetic component of well-known and widespread tendency towards alcoholism in native populations, work needs to be done to change ideas about liquor consumption, because it has a very good chance of actually killing them.  But non-aboriginals can't do this; attempts to change the outlook from outside are destined to fail.  This they must truly do themselves; we can only help where needed.

We give natives far more taxpayer money that they can do what they please with (including building better infrastructure, getting educated, etc). The fact that they piss it all away gambling and getting drunk is not my problem.

I find it interesting that you can, within 24 hours or so, both accuse someone else here of being a bigot and dehumanize the pre-Columbian population of this continent.  Although I suppose you could be implying that Europeans are the non-human species, which makes you simply wrong instead of a hypocrite.

So are you just playing devil's advocate, or did you actually mean to make a distinction between Europeans and well, anyone else?

I don't ever think I once raised the idea that life is, was, or should be fair; I am also fairly understanding of the concept of change as it applies to societies.

However, unlike your apparent social program of "tough shit, intercultural conflict losers!", I believe we are a better people now than we were a couple of centuries ago.  To whit, we can realize that gee, maybe our previous social approaches should be improved.

I agree; native "spirituality" is as devoid of substance as all other religious belief.  Good thing for me I never took the  position you're shooting down.

I am in no way romanticizing their pre-Euro contact society; people the world over are just as bloody-minded, violent and avaricious as any other.  You are arguing against a position I have not taken, and going off on a wide tangent to boot.  I am not ascribing a higher value to the "noble indian" myth; I'm saying responsible adults fix what they break.

I rather simplified the timeline, I know; I was making a point about the end result of the process, not its starting point.

As an aside, you're doing it again: caricaturing the physical appearance of a stereotypical first nations member isn't exactly what I would call a reasoned rebuttal of a position.

Wait, so you're describing European colonization of North America as being not "just" a land grab, but also as naked, predatory capitalism, social elitism and rampant entitlement?  I can get behind that.

Your version being roughly paraphrased as "they just wanted to make a buck; the calculated extermination of the existing population was just collateral damage" reminds me of a story a neighbour told me, who grew up in a mid-sized town in Georgia: one of his grade school history books described southern American involvement in the African slave trade as "...and then, our friends from Africa came over to help us run our cotton fields."

Candy-coating a brutal process of extermination, degradation and domination by force doesn't mean the process wasn't any of those things: it means you have an agenda in making it seem otherwise.

I know this.  Not all genocide is done with soldiers' guns.  Sometimes they use cavalry sabers or smallpox-infected blankets, too.

Can you give me any references, web-accessible or otherwise, that would back this up?

Yes,  you are: welcome to parliamentary democracy.  If you vote against a party that does something you disagree with, that's exercising your share of control over the governing of your country.  You do get to try to punish Stephen Harper for making bad decisions, or support him with good ones.  I'm sorry if you don't like having that responsibility; my advice is to withdraw from society altogether.

People seem to conveniently forget that they have the ability to change their government when that government becomes distasteful.  Don't claim that you do not have the ability to do so, unless for some reason you are barred from voting, campaigning, making phone calls, writing letters and talking to people.

Nor did I advocate attempting to go back to do those things, nor advocating that natives do not have to get past the past (they do have to get past it, because dwelling on your past, good or bad, is a great way to arrest your development).  I am advocating that everyone accepts that the fact that it did happen is not okay, and that we should take responsibility for our part in it and do what we can to make sure that everyone gets equal access to things to care for and better themselves, like health care and education; instead of hoping that if we give them enough cash that they'll just stop reminding us that bad things were done to them.  Is this revolutionary?

No.  Why do you want to be?

The only double standard here is the one you're inventing for me to be proposing.  My position is that what has been advocated until now is at best a band-aid: throwing money at a problem does not make that problem go away (see: airline security), which is what treaty money or casinos amounts to.  I am saying what any underserved population needs to help themselves is the same level of access to services that the majority of other people have.

Yes; some people make stupid decisions and believe stupid things.  Yes, they should be responsible for their stupidity.  No, not everyone in Canada or the US has remotely the same access to resources that others do.

After all this, it seems that what you are objecting to is the native population getting any assistance from the Canadian government in surviving several calculated attempts to eradicate them.  I agree with you about the treaty money and special funds; many people think that giving someone money makes a problem go away.  I disagree with you on the responsibility of the government to help.

So is it just natives that you think the government shouldn't take some additional steps to assist, or is it any group that, in your estimation, lost the "conflict" with the dominant society?  I'm honestly trying to figure out exactly what it is to which you object about this whole situation.

That's not wholly true.  I am surprised to read such remarks from you, Kevin.

Next thing, you'll be agitating to let any two consenting adults to marry and raise children together just because they happen to love each other, or actually objecting to the idea that because a company made money under a given business model gives them the right to continue to make money under that business model regardless of any social or technological developments.

No sir, we can't have that.  Please report to detention.

Leading with an Ad Hominem.

No doubt the argument that follows will be bullet-proof, then.

(And while we're on this topic, I invite you to go ahead and look at the subtext of Cpt. Pineapple's claim, that he doesn't ride in buses because they stop in 'the wrong areas of town' 'are full of bums and drunks' and 'ave gang members on them'. Not that it matters anyway: the thread was a fucking joke. I suppose you missed the post that caused me to simply shrug and walk out ofthe argument, where he basically backpedaled on everything he'd said and finally just admitted that he doesn't like public transit because he's socially anxious?)

That's not what you're suggesting at all. You're suggesting that our current culture, with all the strides it's made, should still pay lip service to the 'cultural needs' of the native americans, and fork-over wads of cash for things that were done by an entirely different generation of people and an entirely different culture.

Moreover, what did the other culture do that was 'wrong'? If the natives were already living a more savage and brutish life over here before we came visiting, and it wasn't the utopian paradise native speakers always make it out to be (as you already conceded), what exactly did we 'ruin'?

Your entire argument here hinges on the notion that the natives had things so much better over here before the europeans came along and changed their culture. If they didn't, again, what exactly did we ruin? If we didn't ruin anything, and indeed, helped them to improve their culture, what did we do wrong?

Spoken like a true noble savage anarchist and Marxist.

Go back a re-read my statement. What I'm arguing was that was no intention to cause a genocide. In fact, the term 'genocide' is inappropriate - 'plague' would be better. The europeans cae looking for trade. Yes, there was racist motivation - but it was not wholly a malicious agenda. The racism involved was that europeans considered indiginous people to be stupid savages; they felt they could exploit this to make better trades.

There was no 'calculated extermination'. That's absurd. What you're essentially arguing, then, was there was a massive european conspiratoral plot to decimate their trade outlet with biological warfare and infighting. That's not just contradictory - it's lunacy.

There wasno genocide. The transfer of smallpox to the native americans was accidental - the european traders did not have the immunology knowledge or technology necessary to realize that they were carrying parasites that, while they themselves had grown immune to, the natives would be extremely vulnerable to.

Again, what your suggesting is ridiculous.

'I say, Frederick, did you make sure you lathered-up with smallpox solution this morning, before you got on the boat? We want to make sure veryone does their part in making this disease-based genocide a success!'

'Oh, yes, very good Patrick. I also brought along my plague-rat filled luggage, just for added effect.'

To back-up the historical knowledge that europeans did not simply jump off their boats and start shooting like gun-crazed lunatics?

No, to be honest, I don't have a reference book handy. You'll have to go find one on your own.

I voted for my Liberal candidate. Guess what? It didn't matter. I was outvoted.

So how, again, am I now able to excercize control over the country, having excercized my voting rights?

 - I voted

 - Stephen Harper won the election anyway

 - I did not want Stephen Harper to win (I voted Liberal)

 - I do not have the ability to 'change the government', even if I find it distasteful. Only if I were in the majority would I have such 'power', and even then, the notion of personal power is an illusion. It's the majority group that actually has the power.

Horse shit. That's exactly what you're arguing. You're saying that because bad things happened to the good natives a long time ago (an assertion I disagree with, but anyway...), I should have to fork-out for it. Nevrmind that it wasn't me doing the bad things, nevermind that it was an age ago, nevermind that bad things happen to good people all the time and that life isn't sacred - the natives deserve my money, because they feel they were unfairly misappropriated from their 'ideal lifestyle'.

I say, 'Fuck that'.

See: The many times I've pointed-out above that 'calculated eradication' is a bogus term.

The natives are entitled to every right and freedom I am. Guess what that comes with? Every inch of personal responsibility, progression and adaptability, too. You're right: they should have access to everything I do. Guess what? They do. Equal opportunity employment and education is a wide-open market, and I don't know of a school or business legally allowed to turn away aboriginal people (which is a wonderful step forward that you're basically ignoring or marginalizing with your own argument). On top of that, they recieve a fat cheque from the government, tax breaks, and special exceptions and exemptions in legal proceedings.

Correct on both accounts. I don't see why taxpayers are being held responsible for something that happened centuries ago, between entirely different societies, and I don't see why natives should get to whine and cry for hours on end about their cultural assimilation. They belly ache about it as though their lifestyle was so much more pristine and harmonious than the one 'forced' upon them.

It's curious to me:

The natives centuries ago did not need to trade with the europeans. They did not need to allow the settlers to come and bring their ideas and trinkets into their communities. As it turns-out, though - the natives were every bit as greedy as the europeans who came to exploit them. They wanted the trade, th wealth and the technology as much as the europeans wanted to become rich.

It's an undeniable truth - yet one that most First Nations leaders simply won't admit to, as it ruins their sob story.

So, tomorrow, your father goes out and commits a double homocide and then kills himself. Since the authorities can no longer arrest him for the crime, they decide to arrest you (and any siblings you have) instead, since you're next of kin, even though you had nothing to do with the crime.

Is that fair? Why or why not?

Here's to missing the point!  Cheers!  I'm really dissapointed in you Kevin.

I've been attempting to critique him on his site since you showed us this, but I don't know enough about Aristotle to do it. This guy is a hardcore dualist.

Alcoholism is rampant in native communities, and casinos are a well-established means that native americans use to generate revenue. 'Droopy-eyed' was in reference to the emotional state most chiefs are in when they address a television camera about the woes of 'his people's' past.

It's not racism to suggest that gambling and drinking are a real problem among native americans. It's being realistic. You yourself even alluded to such problems existing.

...Oh, and just FYI; 'indian' is a term I haven't used to describe native americans. That's been you; and 'indian' is a derrogatory term.

And of course, an honest guy like yourself wouldn't be taking this letter out of context, right?

This was actually an isolated incident - part of the Pontiac Rebellion in 1763. A very large offensive was mounted against european settlements, forts, trading posts, etc by the native americans. When the natives surrounded and besieged the isolated Fort Pitt, William Trent - the commander of the Fort - made the decision to try the smallpox infected blanket trick in order to break the siege. It's clear enough from his writing that he was a racist; however, historical records demonstrate that there was also little conventional that the fort could've done to break out.

Wrong or right, the strategy was used by a defending party to fend off aggressors, and it worked. 

Historians also agree that there is no evidence that the majority of large smallpox infections were intentional. This is an excerpt from this wikipedia page, which is well-cited:

...More or less exactly what I already said (except that apparently scholars also fault native american assaults on european settlements, as well as tribal infighting).

I haven't researched this one, to be honest. I wuldn't be surprised if the commonly held assertions here are false as well. Regardless, you're committing a fallacy of equivocation to support your argument:

Whether or not the Zulu were actually the victim of wholesale slaughter and genocide has no bearing on the fact that native americans almost certainly were not.

I actually had no intention of carrying on the conversation.  I thought it was fairly obvious that the money is objectionable.  Money in the hands of the aboriginal will not solve the social problems.  I haven't stated this, but I absolutely do not believe in reparation and think it's wholly damaging to society as a whole (unless the people getting reparation are the ones who were actually wronged themselves, Japanese migrants for instance).  It carries the theme of original sin, don't you think?  Somehow, I'm responsible for what some people I'm not even related to except in ancient history (seriously, I'm second generation Canadian) visited upon the now distant ancestors of aboriginal Canadians?  I don't buy that bullshit.  What I think is the responsibility of all Canadians is the social health of all aspects of our society.  If the real effect of history and the now built up and continuing and worsening social ills of aboriginal Canadians is a problem, it needs to be addressed exactly (though hopefully more effectively) as general poverty has been addressed, with programmes that will aid people in overcoming whatever barriers they face in acheiving a healthy society.  I am socialist in this respect and I believe that a vast majority of Canadians are.  I believe you are or else I'm mistaken.  I'll renig on my statements if all this is is a misunderstanding.  Do you disagree that money is not helping the problem and that targeted programmes that relieve the poverty and improve social conditions would be beneficial?  If no, then all's right as rain.

You and I are totally on the same page as far as money / reparations are concerned, then. I think we just ahd a miscommunication.

As for targeted programs; I'd like to see our conservative government in Alberta try-out some of the more progressive solutions to be found in Ontario. Ideas like the 'wet' clinics, where people are taken-in and slowly weened off of a substance, rather than trying to totally cut them off outright.

You're off a digit or so. Last I checked it was around 5.6% on average. Most programs only cite the percentage of people who actually complete the program rather than doing actual research to see whether they "stay off the wagon," so to speak. As usual, "faith based initiative" funded programs in the US are the worst at this.

The problem in the US is that virtual all of the rehab places are either explicitly or implicitly (ie 10 step) religiously based. There's one around here totally Christian based - they won't even hire women to work there, except maybe as a secretary.